Making combustible gas and converting hydrocarbon oils



A. P. SACHS April 24, 1934.

MAKING COMBUS'IIBLE GAS AND CONVERTING HYDROCARBON OILS Filed Dec. 28,1929 I INVENT R ATTORNEY Patented Apr. 24, 1934 MAKING COMBUSTIBLE GASAND CON- VERTIN G HYDROCARBON OHIS Albert P. Sachs, New York, N. Y.,assignor to Petroleum Conversion Corporation, New York,

a corporation of Delaware Application December 28, 1929, Serial No.417,025

2 Claims.

My present invention relates to a process for simultaneously makingwater gas or other fuel gas and converting or cracking hydrocarbon oils.It has been proposed, as for example in the patout to Knox No.1,715,239, to convert hydrocarbon oil into compounds of lower molecularweight suitable as motor fuels by the aid of substantially neutral heatcarrier gas. To carry out such a process it is necessary to providemeans for heat- 0 ing up relatively large qauntities of gas ofthisnature and also to subject an even greater quantity of such gas to astripping operation to separate therefrom the lighter vapors which otherr wise would be lost and which are particularly valuable in motor fuels.This process is dependent in large measure for its successful operationboth on a supply of hot heat-carrier gas and the ability'to strip fromthe residual gas the lighter vapors of the cracked products. In the artof 20 making water or producer gas, on the other hand, the gas generatedmay be of a temperature in excess of 1,000 F. which makes possible theuse of this gas as a heat carrier without further heat- 25 ing for theconversion or cracking of hydrocarbon oils. Moreover, less attentionneed be given the stripping of the gas since such lighter vapors as areleft in the gas contribute to its heating and illuminating value. It isaccordingly an object of my 0 invention to provide a process andapparatus by means of which a substantially continuous generation ofcombustible gas may be produced, the sensible heat of which will beutilized for converting hydrocarbon oils in the vapor phase. A fur- 3ther object is to utilize the heat produced in the so-called blastingoperation for the cracking or converting step by providing a suitableregenerative heating means for storing this heat; without, however,having to introduce the oil into contact with heated checkerwork whichwould prevent the maintaining of a uniform temperature of conversion,and would cause deposition of carbon in said heated checkerwork.

My invention will be best understood by ref- 45 erence to the followingdetailed description taken with the annexed drawing which shows anillustrative embodiment thereof.

Referring to the drawing by characters of reference, denotes a water gasgenerator which 50 has a fuel bed 11 and is provided with the usual airinlet 13, steam inlets 14, 15, gas oiftakes 1'7, 18. Preferably, as iscustomary in the art, the generator 10 has an oiltake both above andbelow the fuel bed as indicated by 1'? and 18, respectively,

55 by means of which the fuel may be blasted either from the top orbottom, suitable valves 19, being provided for accomplishing this. Apipe 22 communicatingwith offtake 1'7 admits air through oiftakes 17, 18from a source not shown.

Generator 10 communicates with the superheater 25 by means of extension26 of ofitake 17. superheater 25 is provided with the usual refractorycheckerwork 27 which acts to store heat contained in the producer orblast gas from the generator 10. For the purpose of admitting air forthe complete combustion of this gas, a pipe 29 is provided leading froma source, not shown, of air under pressure. The spent gas and combustionproducts leave the superheater at the bottom thereof through a valvedofitake 30 leading to stack 31. A second offtake 33 also valved isprovided for water gas, such oiftake communicating with a pipe 34 whichin turn leads into a pipe 35 terminating in a reaction chamber 36, whichas shown is preferably without filling material therein.

As shown, a duplicate set comprising a generator and superheater isprovided, such set being identified with the same reference charactersadditioned by a prime the offtake 34 for the water gas being common toboth sets. By means of the two sets of generator and superheater, asubstantially continuous supply of hot water gas may be supplied to thereaction chamber 36.

For the purpose of furnishing hydrocarbon vapor to be converted, avaporizing apparatus denoted generally by is provided; This com prisesan evaporating coil 42, a pipe 74 supply ing same with oil tobeevaporated, a connection 43 from said coil to a flash drum 44 foradmitting vaporized products thereto, a vapor offtake 45 from said drumand a return connection 46 joining pipe 47 for leading back unvaporizedproducts from the drum to said coil. A pipe 47 provides for thedischarge of residue from said drum. For the purpose of heating the coil42, a burner 48 and a baflie 49 are provided, the ofltake for thecombustion gases being omitted for clearness.

Vapor ofitake 45 leads to the top of reaction chamber 36 whereby thegenerated vapor is admitted to the reaction chamber. In order that auniform temperature may be maintained in reaction chamber 36, I havefound it advisable to provide a source 50 oi tempering gas at a lowertemperature, which gas is led on through a pipe 51, pump 52 and thenadmitted to pipe 35 leading to chamber 36. By means of a valve 53 aregulated supply of tempering gas may be had, this valve preferablybeing regulated automatically by thermostatically controlled means whichper se is well known in the art. The vapor from the evaporator 40mingles with the hot water gas preferably above 1150" F., a relationbetween vapor and water gas being chosen so that the reactiontemperature is in the neighborhood of 950- 1050" F. The mixture ofproducts and water gas leaves the reaction chamber through a pipethrough which it passes to a scrubber 56. In this apparatus carbon andtarry products are removed by means of a suitable menstruum, as, forexample, a heavy oil which is circulated through the apparatus by meansof a .pipe 5'7, pump 58 and spray nozzle 59. A connection 60 providesfor the admission of the menstruum and an offtake 61 for the withdrawalof the hot carboncontaining menstruum which is thence conducted to asuitable settling and a cooling device, not shown. If desired, thisheated menstruum may be led into heat interchange with the oil enteringthe system by means of apparatus not shown. The products which have thusbeen subjected to the scrubbing operation are led from the scrubberthrough pipe to a rectifier 72 containing suitable filling material 73and in which a suitable oil is caused to circulate. A conduit '71 admitsmake-up oil to this apparatus. Under most circumstances it may bedesirable to pass the oil from the rectifier '72 through conduits 74 and41 to evaporating coil 42 and thereby utilize this oil in the conversionstep. Means are provided in the form of a pipe '76, pump 77 and spraynozzle '78 for circulating the oil directly from the bottom of therectifier through this apparatus. It will be understood that suitablemeans are provided for abstracting the heat in the oil drawn off in pipe'76 and for re-introducing the cooled oil at the top of the rectifier.The residue draw-off '79 is also provided at the bottom of therectifier.

The gases from the rectifier '72 are drawn off through pipe 81 and passthrough condenser 83 from which the condensate is collected inaccumulator 85. In this accumulator is the bulk of the desired productof the conversion reaction, namely, a gasoline-like liquid suitable as amotor fuel. The gas leaving the accumulator 85 may be passed through amain 89 for any industrial or domestic use or, preferably, it may firstbe subjected to a further stripping operation for the recovery of lightgasoline compounds. Preferably a small portion of the gas after beingfirst stripped is led oif through a pipe 91 to a. holder 50 for thepurpose of supplying tempering of the gas admitted to the reactionchamber as previously described.

In the operation of my process, oil to be converted may be admitted tothe system at any one of several places. If the oil contains lightfractions which it is desired to separate, it is best admitted to thescrubber 56 through 'pipe 60.

The oil is for the most part vaporized in the scrubber whereinconditions are maintained so that only the very heavy fractions which asa rule would be unsuited for cracking or conversion are separated out.The vaporized portions are rectified in the rectifier '72 whereupon thefractions heavier than gasoline are conveyed to the evaporating coil 42by means of pipe '74. Conditions are preferably maintained in theevaporator such as to vaporize the oil without substantial crackingthereof, whereby the heat required for the conversion of the hydrocarbonvapor admitted to the reaction chamber 36 is furnished entirely by theheat of the hot water-gas. However, if desired, the vapor so admitted tothe reaction chamber may be previously superheated in apparatus notshown. Under certain circumstances, all or a portion of the oil may beadmitted to the system through pipe '71 leading to the rectifier '72. Ingeneral, the pressure used will have rather little influence upon theproduct obtained and ordinarily a pressure will be chosen conforming tostandard water gas practice. Other conditions remaining the same, ahigher pressure facilitates recovery of condensible hydrocarbons fromthe gas while a reduced pressure favors the retention of such products.

While I have illustrated my invention as applied to a process andapparatus for making water gas, it will be apparent that in its broaderaspects it is also applicable to the manufacture of producer gas.

I claim:

1. In the method of simultaneously making an industrially useful, atleast partially carburetted combustible gas and converting hydrocarbonoils into motor fuels, the steps which consist in first generating watergas and so conducting the generation as to produce a gas having atemperature in excess of 1150 F. while compensating for the variation intemperature of the gas incident to water gas manufacture by introducinginto the gas stream a regulated supply of gas of similar characterthereby rendering the temperature of said gas stream substantiallyuniform, passing said gas to a reaction zone, subjecting oil to beconverted to vaporizing conditions without substantial cracking thereofand mingling in said reaction zone the vapor 'so produced and said hotgas to bring about conversion to the oil vapor at a substantiallyuniform temperature in excess of 900 F., subjecting the mixture ofconverted vapor and gas to conditions producing liquefaction of theproducts useful as motor fuels while leaving in said gas streamconde'nsible products lighter than gasoline whereby to carburet saidindustrially useful gas.

2. The method according to claim 1 including generating a continuoussupply of water gas.

ALBERT P. SACHS.

